He climbed unsteadily to his feet and confronted Danny. Danny was naked and the color of the red golem clay. His ribs showed and his hair was matted and greasy.
“I’m coming home,” Danny said, baring his teeth. His breath reeked of corruption and uncooked meat, and his mouth was ringed with a crust of dried vomit. “And you’re not going to stop me.”
“You don’t have a home,” Alan said, pressing the hilt of the knife over the wound in his bicep, the feeling like biting down on a cracked tooth. “You’re not welcome.”
Davey was monkeyed over low, arms swinging like a chimp, teeth bared, knees splayed and ready to uncoil and pounce. “You think you’ll stab me with that?” he said, jerking his chin at the knife. “Or are you just going to bleed yourself out with it?”
Alan steadied his knife hand before him, unmindful of the sticky blood. He knew that the pounce was coming, but that didn’t help when it came. Davey leapt for him and he slashed once with the knife, Davey ducking beneath the arc, and then Davey had his forearm in his hands, his teeth fastened onto the meat of his knife thumb.
Andre rolled to one side and gripped down hard on the knife, tugging his arm ineffectually against the grip of the cruel teeth and the grasping bony fingers. Davey had lost his boyish charm, gone simian with filth and rage, and the sore and weak blows Alan was able to muster with his hurt arm didn’t seem to register with Danny at all as he bit down harder.
Arnold dragged his arm up higher, dragging the glinting knifetip toward Davey’s face. Drew kicked at his shins, planted a knee alongside his groin. Alan whipped his head back, then brought it forward as fast and hard as he could, hammering his forehead into the crown of Davey’s head so hard that his head rang like a bell.
He stunned Davey free of his hand and stunned himself onto his back. He felt small hands beneath each armpit, dragging him clear of the hill. Brian. And George. They helped him to his feet and Breton handed him the knife again. Darren got onto his knees, and then to his feet, holding the back of his head.
They both swayed slightly, standing to either side of Chris’s rise. Alan’s knife-hand was red with blood streaming from the bite wounds and his other arm felt unaccountably heavy now.
Davey was staggering back and forth a little, eyes dropping to the earth. Suddenly, he dropped to one knee and scrabbled in the dirt, then scrambled back with something in his hand.